Tag Archives: NewsOK

Last Month, we wrote about how Oklahoma’s low voter turnout is good news for petitioners in 2016. Shortly after, the Oklahoman published an editorial that references that article, although without a link. In this editorial, the Oklahoman Editorial Board agrees that this is good news, but that the burden is still too high.

In talking about the failed petitions from this past election cycle, the Oklahoman states that voter turnout might have been higher had they made it to the ballot.

We termed this a “glimmer” of good news because it’s only that — a slight opening in the brick wall that prevents most initiative petitions and alternative candidacies from reaching the ballot. Imagine the increase in turnout had referenda involving school storm shelters and marijuana law liberalization made the 2014 ballot.

Instead, Oklahoma’s overly burdensome ballot access requirements helped limit the referenda list to three noncontroversial state questions that had been advanced by the Legislature rather than petition organizers.

They state that the signature burden and the limited time to gather those signatures needs reformed.

What is burdensome in Oklahoma is ballot access. Not only do initiative petitions require too many signatures, but the circulation period is limited to 90 days. More time is needed.

Finally, the note that 2016 could be the fourth election in a row without an alternative Presidential Candidate on the ballot.

Knight says that without access reform, 2016 will be the fourth consecutive presidential election in which no alternative party nominees will be on the Oklahoma ballot. Oklahoma is the only state in which a new or previously unqualified party needs support from more than 2 percent of votes cast in the previous general election.

If the threshold were 1 percent, the Libertarian Party’s next presidential nominee would make the 2016 ballot because a Libertarian candidate for governor this year got nearly 2 percent of the vote.

Over the weekend, we had a letter to the editor published to both NewsOK and at the Tulsa World. Both sites, published the letter with little modifications. The letter itself is mostly a rehash of our earlier article about Oklahoma’s low voter turnout and its impact on future petitions. It also called for real reform to pass.

However, there was one problem. I wanted to respond to a comment on the Tulsa World which I felt poorly reflected on the current petitioning climate. Tulsa World reader J. Lee wrote:

It appears that many people don’t really care what happens. But that is absolutely no reason to lower the party petitioning burden especially to what it was 40-50 years ago since the population has increased over a million since that time.

Any entity which lowers it standards to appease a few will eventually be left with no standards.

What J. Lee wrote here does a real disservice to those seeking to form a new party in Oklahoma. It is based on the false premise that Oklahoma’s petitioning laws and the change in 1974 was based on some actual reasoning based on population. That is not true at all.

The problem with this is that the Tulsa World’s commenting policy prevents me from responding to this comment directly. The Tulsa World wants me to pay nearly $200 just to comment on articles of interest. That is not happening. So instead, I am responding here in the hopes that interested people will read it and misinformation will be cleared away. If anyone out there has a subscription or still has commenting enabled because they have not reached their monthly ration of articles, feel free to respond to J. Lee with the following:

Let me lay out a few facts for you. I hope that I won’t have to explain any of this too much.

If we wanted to adjust the number of signatures needed to form a new party based on population, then we would have this amount:
5,000 plus a 46.6% change = 7,330 signatures today.

However, if we base it off of voting population, we would get this number:
5,000 plus a 26.2% change = 6,310

Both of those calculations are far far smaller than the current signature requirement that is 1235% higher than it was in 1972.

So do you want to rethink your position?

Again, I would love to respond myself. When I aired my issues with the Tulsa World on Twitter, their only response was to upsell me on a subscription. They offered no real solution. I guess, if anyone wants a real conversation on a news site, they will have to go with NewsOK where all you need is a free account to read everything and comment to all articles.

Support for ballot access reform is growing in Oklahoma. For many years, we have fought to reduce the burden posed to those who wish to form new parties in Oklahoma. As of today, Oklahoma’s top two newspapers have expressed their support for easing Oklahoma’s worst in the nation ballot access laws.

Currently, parties seeking recognition have to obtain the signatures equal to 5 percent of the votes cast in the most recent general election. That currently works out to 66,744 petition signatures.

House Bill 2134 would cut that requirement in half.

Why do they support this measure? Because they recognize that the rising generation is moving further away from the current duopoly parties.

Political thinking is changing. The next generation of voters is not nearly as loyal to the traditional two-party system as their grandparents were. Independent voters are the fastest growing segment of the state voting pool. Many young voters want boutique parties molded to their specific political thinking rather than big-tent parties based on broad principles and old loyalties.

However, the Tulsa World does express some interest in keeping some burden in place. They feel that too low a barrier could lead to a glut of “marginal, schismatic groups”, but that should not stand in the way of reasonable accommodations.

We support lowering the standard for party recognition. We don’t want the number so low that it will produce a flowering of marginal, schismatic groups with no hope of ever electing a candidate, but reasonable accommodations of new modes of political thought could engage new voters and force the two big parties to make sure they are addressing issues of importance to all Oklahomans.

We are not clear exactly where the Tulsa World feels that line should be drawn. Even if HB2134 becomes law, Oklahoma would still have the highest burden in the nation for forming a new party or getting a candidate on the Presidential ballot. No other state has more than a 2% requirement. Additionally, in the decades prior to 1974, where the signature burden was 5,000 signatures, Oklahoma never saw more than 5 candidates for Governor or President. So even something easier than 2.5% would theoretically meet the Tulsa World requirements.

Colorado’s ballot access law may be too lax, but Oklahoma’s law is at the other end of the spectrum, making it exceedingly difficult for third parties to put a candidate before voters. This year, just as in 2008 and 2004, Oklahomans had only two options for president, the Democrat or the Republican. Twelve years ago, Pat Buchanan managed to get on the ballot here as an independent.

During an appearance in Oklahoma City two years ago, consumer advocate Ralph Nader said our state’s ballot access rules are among the nation’s toughest. “A competitive democracy with multiple candidates, multiple ideas, multiple backgrounds and multiple agendas is going to bring more people out to vote and we’re going to have a better political process,” he said.

Donna Bebo, who ran as a Democrat for the 4th Congressional District seat, put it this way: “Candidates should not win simply because of who they keep off the ballot. They should win on their own merit.” She has a point.

In conservative Oklahoma, Republicans enjoy firm and growing control of the Legislature. They have nothing to fear from providing a voice to others, by lowering some of the significant hurdles now in place for third-party candidates trying to get on our ballot.

Now that Oklahoma’s two largest news organizations have put their editorial muscle behind our efforts, will the State Legislature follow through and actually pass HB2134? Right now, the ball is in the Senate’s court and unfortunately, they have made moves to stall the bill as much as possible. Not only did they wait until the last day it could be heard in committee to pass it to the floor, but they also had the title and enacting clause stricken, a move that ensures it is forced to a conference committee if both are not restored prior to a floor vote. If the bill does get sent to a conference committee it is highly likely that it will die there just as previous ballot access reform bills have done.

We are working hard to ensure that the title and enacting clause are restored prior to a Senate vote, but have not received responses to any of our efforts to reach out to Senator Marlatt.

We agree. Oklahoma is one of the few states that do not allow for write-in candidates for any election. This needs to change. When people do not see a candidate they can support on the ballot, they would rather stay home than vote for someone they don’t support. Allowing for write-ins would provide those people and opportunity to cast a vote for the person they support while at the same time declaring their no confidence vote in the named candidates.

I agree with E. Zachary Knight (Your Views, Feb. 6) that Oklahoma needs ballot access reform. However, Knight didn’t go far enough, and neither do proposed changes to ballot access from the Legislature. In addition to reducing the number of signatures needed to start a new party, Oklahomans need the right to write in candidates on the ballot, like 42 other states. Other impediments to access, and thus an absence of real democracy, remain.

What are our legislators afraid of? The voters who put them in office to begin with? This isn’t some radical left-wing agenda that Oklahoma conservatives need to stave off. This is democracy! If the policymakers at the Capitol are going to continue this ridiculous stonewalling on ballot reform, they need to offer Oklahomans a good explanation. In the meantime, those citizens should contact their representatives and tell them to start making these commons-sense, democratic changes to Oklahoma law and bring us into the modern era of ballot access and voting rights.

I regularly send letters to the editor. I find it to be a great way to address issues that often get overlooked by the media. Ballot Access Reform is one of those issue. Of all the media sites in Oklahoma, NewsOK seems to be one of the easier outlets to get a letter published. While NewsOK already took the stance that Oklahoma needs reform, that was many weeks before the Legislative session began. So it is important to keep this issue in the forefront of the media. So I sent a letter to NewsOK and other media outlets and NewsOK was the first to publish it.

So here is the original unedited version of the letter:

Once again, Ballot Access Reform is on the table in Oklahoma. Will this year be the year that Oklahoma joins the rest of the US in easing the requirements to form a new party? Will this year be the year that Oklahoma citizens can look forward to real choice in future Presidential elections? Or will we see a continuation of the status quo?

Unfortunately, things are off to a very rocky start. While bills have been introduced in both the State House and Senate, these bills are in the exact same position similar bills were in the past two Legislative Sessions. That position ended with prior efforts dying in Committee. The House version, HB 2134, reduces the signature requirement to 5,000 signatures, the same requirement needed prior to 1974. Yet, the Senate version, SB 668, retains the current 5% requirement but drops the Presidential elections from the equation. This has been the hard Senate line for many years.

It is time for the Senate to end its war on Oklahoma voter choice and amend SB 668 to reflect the language introduced in the House. There are no valid reasons for keeping the status quo. There are no valid reasons for blocking a change for the better in Oklahoma politics. It is time for change. If three Presidential Elections in a Row where Oklahoma was the only state in the US with two choices on the ballot is not evidence to support that, then what is? If three Presidential elections in a row with lower voter turnout than the previous election is not evidence in support of that, then what is?

The following was published on February 6, 2013. I like to post both versions of the letter as it helps to see what edits may get made to your own letters.

Ballot access reform is again on the table in Oklahoma. Will this be the year that we join the rest of the United States in easing the requirements to form a new party? Will this be the year Oklahomans can look forward to real choice in future presidential elections? Or will we see a continuation of the status quo?

Unfortunately, things are off to a rocky start. While bills have been introduced in both houses of the Legislature, these bills are in the same position as similar bills were in the past two legislative sessions. That position ended with prior efforts dying in committee. The House version, House Bill 2134, reduces the signature requirement to 5,000, the same requirement needed prior to 1974. Yet the Senate version, Senate Bill 668, retains the current 5 percent requirement but drops the presidential elections from the equation. This has been the hard Senate line for many years.

It’s time for the Senate to end its war on Oklahoma voter choice and amend SB 668 to reflect the language introduced in the House. There are no valid reasons for keeping the status quo and blocking a change for the better in Oklahoma politics. It’s time for change. If three presidential elections in a row when Oklahoma was the only state with two choices on the ballot isn’t evidence to support that, what is?

So please, write letters to every newspaper you can and voice your support for reform in this state. The more voices that are aired, the more will be heard.

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The Case For Ballot Access Reform

Oklahomans for Ballot Access Reform is once again calling on state lawmakers to demonstrate their faith in democracy and hand the keys to the electoral process back over to the voting public. To this end, we have written and published a brief putting forth the evidence in support of Ballot Access Reform.
Read and Share the Press Release and Ballot Access Brief.